Moving on to 2015 and with Kesgrave now established, we were able to start the year with our first joint New Years Day double. Not content with keeping it that simple we gave our runners multiple options.
With hindsight we didn’t offer the run 1/volunteer 1 option but I know some people took that option.
127 Did the double, 58 did Ipswich only and 137 did Kesgrave only (Ipswich had 11 unknown and Kesgrave had 16) 196 at Ipswich and 280 at Kesgrave
With February 14th falling on a Saturday, there was only really one place for me to be, so I was up early for the trip to the place my parkrun journey started.
A little bit corny but that’s parkrun for you, making you do things just for the sake of it.
In March a special moment happened at Ipswich juniors as we had our first junior runner to receive a marathon wristband. Even better as far as I was concerned was the recipient, a young Alani Keer. Her father Adam, was once again the key contact at Ipswich Borough Council and he had sorted out half the finance for the event starting in the first place. As he says on his Facebook post:-
Alani completed her junior parkrun marathon during the first 21 weeks, the first Half Marathon was completed in 3:34:09, 2nd half was a negative split 3:16:45 giving a marathon time of 6:50:54 spread over 21 weeks.
The recognition structure is slightly different at junior events, ½ marathon after 11 runs (or 22kms), Marathon at 21 (42 kms), Ultra at 50 (100 kms) and later a 100 and 250 was added to the wristbands.
The end of the month saw my “media” profile rise just a little bit when Sky TV came along to do a piece about the increase in people running and in particular running as a result of parkrun.
The actual item didn’t go out for another 9 days, but at least it wasn’t a Saturday morning.
Not to be outdone or to let my TV debut go to my head it was back to my regular media slot later in the day
This was following an interview on the Sunday morning at Ipswich juniors
Somewhere in this trip down memory lane I will have written that parkrun isn’t just about the run or it’s more than just a run. In this case it was all about a scoot
Moving on to May 2015 and another trip to Birmingham for the third Ambassadors conference. At the time I hadn’t made the decision, but this was my final conference.
A different venue for our parkrun fix that year as we went to Perry Hall parkrun
The addition of the Ambassadors and parkrun Royalty, saw the event hit a 3 digit attendance, 213, for only the second time, first was the inaugural with 194, this was event number 28. It was a good job that the Ambassadors contributed to the volunteer community that day. Looking at the record books for the event, it wasn’t until December 2018 that this number was surpassed. I don’t recall too much about the conference itself which is a shame. I do recall that the meal that year was a BBQ though at one of the presenters from the conference.
Sometimes, it isn’t always at a parkrun event that you get recognised. A simple trip to the cinema can also prove to have a connection
The press were really picking up on the impact that parkrun was having. This meant I was in demand yet again for more quotes
The next picture really does show what can happen in the time after the run has finished and everyone has gone home. Commonly known as parkfaffing.
Sometimes recognition comes from the most unexpected places.
This young lady demonstrates what junior parkrun can lead to. Having gone past the upper age limit for juniors she moved on to 5km parkrun and joined a local running club.
Although I had stepped down as an Ambassador, Harwich parkrun was still in it’s early stages of becoming a full event so it was agreed with parkrun HQ that I would remain as their Ambassador until their launch. The route that had been designed was predominantly an out and back along the promenade and due to the wind at the test event, it was definitely easier on the “return” section with almost every participant having a negative split. The inaugural took place on August 1st and would be my final 5km inaugural as an Ambassador.
There was a period of time between 2012 and 2015 when I almost became the go to person in Suffolk for the BBC if they ever wanted a view on anything to do with running or sport in general
The start of September saw the very public announcement of my decision to step down as ED of Ipswich parkrun. Although at this stage we had already announced to the community that I was stepping down and Colin and Ali were taking over as Co-Event Directors.
Whilst this was the first time it had been so publicly broadcast, the core team had actually been advised about this back on March 21st, when I sent them an email. In the email I said the following:-
“Today saw event number 131 take place and without realising it a couple of weeks ago we passed the Two and a half year point since our inaugural event. During that time we have achieved phenomenal success and have built an amazing community. I am immensely proud of what we have achieved. We work fantastically together as a team and I strongly believe that this is because of the different strengths that we all bring to the team. We have all seen the success that Jen has made since she decided to step up from our core team and became Event director at Kesgrave. I have no doubt that every one of you has the ability to be an ED in your own right if you so desired and that is the main purpose of this email. In my personal opinion, to keep Ipswich parkrun developing and growing, the time is right for someone else to take on the ED role and to introduce some fresh ideas to the event. I haven’t said the above in order to generate emails from yourselves, telling me what a great job I am doing etc etc. Since starting Ipswich juniors and enjoying that so much, I know I have taken my foot of the pedal with the Saturday parkrun and feel that the end of our 3rd year in September would be a perfect time to hand over the reins. With this in mind, are any of you interested in taken on the ED role on your own or would two of you like to join forces and become Co-ED? Whilst it is also my intention to step down from the core team, I will still be around to give any help or guidance to the new ED and core team and will of course still be down almost every week volunteering. “
At this point in time the core team consisted of John Adams, Ali Ostler, Colin Shaw, Marcia Hullis, Linda Young, Gary Jarvis and myself. In time honoured style we decided to have a proper drink up to talk about it all. Isaacs was the venue of choice and Thursday 2nd April was the date. I think it was whilst we at this gathering that Ali and Colin decided to become Co-EDs.
In parkrun tradition the birthday was fancy dress and because we were doing Super Heroes for Ipswich juniors a few weeks later we went with the same theme.
A couple of days later it was the turn of the EADT
Then baby Kesgrave had it’s first birthday and then I went off for lunch with the Mayor of Ipswich
The weather for Kesgrave’s birthday was certainly better than it was for the inaugural. Then it was time to go and see the mayor. I’m not going to mention that someone made me late.
During the visit I was presented with the following as a thank you from the mayor.
We were also shown around the mayor’s quarters and signed his Guest book with my own page
The final words on my trip are as follows
September 2015 finished with the first birthday of the fantastic Ipswich junior parkrun
From Left to Right – Perry Bush, Ian Ward, Lindsey Ward, Rory Marriott, Heather Bush, Claire Davy
To let the new ED team settle in at Ipswich I went off to do some Voluntourism and some teams were even brave enough to let me be Run Director when I visited. Following my step down I visited Kesgrave for their first birthday celebrations, Basildon (RD), A return visit to Southend, Chelmsford Central (RD), Great Cornard (RD),
Naturally during this Saturday touring around I was still going along to Ipswich juniors every Sunday and towards the end of October the team surprised me with a lovely photobook of our first year.
Thetford was next on my tour list, followed by a trip to the seaside for event number 3 at Lowestoft which had finally managed to get started 20 months after my initial meeting with the council and therefore became my 14th parkrun baby. Another RD slot at Great Cornard followed by a final spot of touring to Rapheal parkrun in Romford. The remainder of 2015 was spent in Ipswich.
During 2015 I completed 0 parkruns and recorded 97 volunteer credits. These were done at 15 events including 6 new ones, and 0 times I both ran and volunteered. Taking my totals to Run – 50, Volunteer 262, of which 24 times I did both. These were completed at 31 different events.